Thank you-- it's crazy how difficult it is to exercise our basic democratic rights. Was going to drop my ballot off at the Paris Embassy yesterday but then saw on their website that you have to allow at least 4 weeks for mail from there to reach its destination, which would be too late for my vote to be counted. So I spent $14.99 (!!!) on a fax app (even that is confusing, with two fax numbers provided! Do I send it to both, or does that count as voting twice and I go to prison or whatever?!). Luckily my state has a ballot tracking site, so I will be checking that daily. Voting should be free and straightforward in any respectable democracy.
Yes!! And so glad you didn’t opt for the diplomatic envelope option — initially, I didn’t even know that was a thing ! But the delays can be even worse than via USPS so not a foolproof option. Fax app: what is that?! (Rhetorical 😵💫). Either way, you did it and that’s important !
New York state makes it very easy. Or, at least New York City does. Weeks before the election, I receive a "Federal Only" ballot since, as a non-resident, I am ineligible to vote for local elections or ballot measures. Everything is online. I get an email with instructions on how to access and download my ballot. Yes, I need to print it, the secrecy envelope and the mailing envelope and fill it out and tape each envelope and put together the packet in the correct order but it's super easy and comes with detailed instructions. I wasn't going to vote this year because I am very upset about U.S. unconditional support for Israel's genocidal aggression. No indication Harris will change that, and Harris will win Manhattan where I vote. But then I saw that Republicans have filed a court cases to ban the counting of overseas ballots in battleground states, and so I sent in mine. (I won't say what I checked but I did not vote for Trump / Vance.) If I decided not to vote, it's my decision not a right I want someone to take away from me, a U.S. citizen. https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/new-wave-gop-lawsuits-target-overseas-ballots-key-swing-states-rcna174934 It seems Democrats are pushing back, accusing Republicans of wanting to disenfranchise overseas military personnel. Let's see.
We were so excited about voting overseas, but only 1 out of 3 of my family got to vote from Mexico. My mother votes in Alaska- she got to fax in her ballot. My partner and I vote in Texas, so we had to mail in ours. But we live in Mexico, where the mail is unreliable. "That's ok," I said. "I'll just pay a few extra bucks and send my ballot via DHL." Nope! DHL won't send to the P.O. Box where my ballot was supposed to go, because DHL doesn't deliver to P.O. boxes. And Texas also has a confusing system where you have to log in to print out your ballot PDF file, your signature page is in a separate PDF file, you have to download both of them, and if you make a mistake you don't get to log in again because that counts as voting twice. So my partner didn't get to vote because he only downloaded the ballot and not the signature page. Stupid Texas. Crossing our fingers that at least my Mom's ballot will be counted in Alaska!
Thank you-- it's crazy how difficult it is to exercise our basic democratic rights. Was going to drop my ballot off at the Paris Embassy yesterday but then saw on their website that you have to allow at least 4 weeks for mail from there to reach its destination, which would be too late for my vote to be counted. So I spent $14.99 (!!!) on a fax app (even that is confusing, with two fax numbers provided! Do I send it to both, or does that count as voting twice and I go to prison or whatever?!). Luckily my state has a ballot tracking site, so I will be checking that daily. Voting should be free and straightforward in any respectable democracy.
Yes!! And so glad you didn’t opt for the diplomatic envelope option — initially, I didn’t even know that was a thing ! But the delays can be even worse than via USPS so not a foolproof option. Fax app: what is that?! (Rhetorical 😵💫). Either way, you did it and that’s important !
New York state makes it very easy. Or, at least New York City does. Weeks before the election, I receive a "Federal Only" ballot since, as a non-resident, I am ineligible to vote for local elections or ballot measures. Everything is online. I get an email with instructions on how to access and download my ballot. Yes, I need to print it, the secrecy envelope and the mailing envelope and fill it out and tape each envelope and put together the packet in the correct order but it's super easy and comes with detailed instructions. I wasn't going to vote this year because I am very upset about U.S. unconditional support for Israel's genocidal aggression. No indication Harris will change that, and Harris will win Manhattan where I vote. But then I saw that Republicans have filed a court cases to ban the counting of overseas ballots in battleground states, and so I sent in mine. (I won't say what I checked but I did not vote for Trump / Vance.) If I decided not to vote, it's my decision not a right I want someone to take away from me, a U.S. citizen. https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/new-wave-gop-lawsuits-target-overseas-ballots-key-swing-states-rcna174934 It seems Democrats are pushing back, accusing Republicans of wanting to disenfranchise overseas military personnel. Let's see.
I didn't realize you wouldn't be able to vote down ballot! You're lucky it's straight forward for New York!
We were so excited about voting overseas, but only 1 out of 3 of my family got to vote from Mexico. My mother votes in Alaska- she got to fax in her ballot. My partner and I vote in Texas, so we had to mail in ours. But we live in Mexico, where the mail is unreliable. "That's ok," I said. "I'll just pay a few extra bucks and send my ballot via DHL." Nope! DHL won't send to the P.O. Box where my ballot was supposed to go, because DHL doesn't deliver to P.O. boxes. And Texas also has a confusing system where you have to log in to print out your ballot PDF file, your signature page is in a separate PDF file, you have to download both of them, and if you make a mistake you don't get to log in again because that counts as voting twice. So my partner didn't get to vote because he only downloaded the ballot and not the signature page. Stupid Texas. Crossing our fingers that at least my Mom's ballot will be counted in Alaska!
We both vote in TN and many parts of the state website are inaccessible without using a VPN.
And I hadn’t even thought of that as a potential issue but OF COURSE
I mean, that is madness!!